In my mind, playing the defending champion Celtics tonight couldn’t have come at a better time. Are the Sixers a better team than the Celtics? Hell no! Do they match up well with the Celtics? Not a chance! Deep down do I think they will win tonight against the Celtics? Nope. But, stranger things have happened. See, I think there is no better time to play the best team in the NBA than coming off that joke of a second half against the Nets. If the Sixers can somehow find a way to play a near perfect 48 minutes, and pull out a victory against the Celtics, that will certainly take the Nets loss and punt it to the moon. (I have no idea where that phrase came from but I’m sticking with it) I had stated on this site that the Sixers needed to win 5 out of 7 games on this home stand. Well, they already lost one and conventional wisdom says that tonight will be number 2. That would mean they need to win all four remaining games, at least, according to yours truly. They can absolutely accomplish that, but not if they allow the loss to the Nets to linger. This is when the leaders of the team need to step to the forefront. How they play against the Celtics will be a good indicator of the team’s toughness. Will they step up and play confident, tough basketball or will they shrink in the face of the mighty Celtics? Will they rid themselves of the demons from Saturday, or will they allow them to stick around for awhile longer. I know it’s hard to use a game that even under normal circumstances we wouldn’t expect the Sixers to win as a barometer. But, that’s where we are. This team needs to restore their confidence or they could be in big trouble. I guess we will see what the Sixers are made of.
The only way to get rid of the stench of a bad loss is to take the court and win. Well, the Sixers didn’t just have a bad loss against the Nets on Saturday, they had a horrible one. It was as ugly a defeat as I can remember seeing. It was completely indefensible. The funny part about a game like that is it can go either way. The psyche of an athlete is a peculiar thing. The loss to the Nets could be the kick in the ass that the Sixers needed. The reminder that even though they had been playing good basketball of late, this is a team that needs to play focused for 48 minutes or they can lose any game to any team. On the flip side, it could have a lingering stench that affects the team until the all star break and possibly beyond. Yes, it’s just one game, but we have all seen how one bad loss can affect more than just one game in the standings. The Ravens debacle and subsequent benching of McNabb seemed to be a catalyst for the turnaround of the Eagles season. Or how about this past college football season when Florida threw up a stink bomb against Mississippi, and Tim Tebow vowed that it wouldn’t happen again. We all know how their season turned out. There are also countless examples of bad losses in every sport that teams never seem to recover from. Obviously, there is no proof of any of this, but the human mind is a strange thing, and confidence or a lack thereof can be quite powerful.
Dude. No dice. Sixers are dust. The top 3 team in the east are SOOO much stronger than the rest of the conference its not even funny. And then there’s Miami.
Sorry dude. Lakers Cavs finals. We’ll really see what’s what on Sunday!!